Judah Series

August 06, 2022

We are going to backtrack a little bit today. It wasn’t until I started writing “Moses at the Burning Bush”, that I realized we really needed to talk about Judah. Here is his story:

Genesis 29:31 tells us that Leah was unloved. When she gave birth to her first son, Reuben, she said, “Now my husband will love me.” What a sad statement.

Two sons later, she was hoping for the same outcome, "Now at last my husband will become attached to me, because I have borne him three sons."

Judah was Leah’s 4th son.

Even after the 6th son, Leah was still holding out hope that Jacob would finally love her and treat her with honor.

Without going down the rabbit hole – we can comfortably say that Leah’s sons would have felt inferior – 2nd rate – because they were the children of someone who was unloved. To know that your father doesn’t love your mother is a terrible weight to carry and no doubt this truth impacted their emotional wellbeing and worldview.

At any rate, years would go by. All the brothers were united in their jealousy and hatred of Joseph. Judah emerged as the leader of the group when he came up with the brilliant idea of making a profit – 20 pieces of silver – off of Joseph instead of killing him.

Inserted in the middle of Joseph’s story we find the story of Judah – Genesis 38.

Judah married a Canaanite woman, named Shua. Together, they had 3 sons – Er, Onan and Shelah. When Er was old enough, Judah got him a wife from the local town. Her name was Tamar.

We are also told that Er sinned and was killed. As was the custom, the 2nd son, Onan, married Tamar in order to produce children in the dead brother’s name. For whatever reason, Onan did not like this arrangement, so intentionally did not get Tamar pregnant. He, too, was killed.

Judah was worried that Tamar was a curse, so he said to her, “listen, Shelah is too young to marry, so return to your father’s house and live as a widow until he’s old enough, then you can marry him.” – Judah had no intention of ever letting this happen, but he needed time to think.

Some years went by and Judah’s wife died. Scripture tells us that when Judah had recovered from his grief, he went, with his friend, Hirah, to Timnah, where the sheep were being sheared.

It came to Tamar’s attention that Judah was in town. By this time, she knew that Judah was not going to fulfill his promise, so, “she took off her widow's clothes, covered herself with a veil to disguise herself, and then sat down at the entrance to Enaim, which is on the road to Timnah.”

When Judah saw her sitting, by the side of the road, he thought she was a prostitute, because her face was covered. He strolled over and propositioned her, “Let me sleep with you.”

“What will you give me?” she asked.

“I left my wallet at home, but I’ll send you a young goat from my flock.” He responded.

“I’ll need some collateral – how about your seal, cord and staff.”

He did – they did – she got pregnant – he went home.

Judah, true to his word sent his friend, Hirah, to make payment, but the “prostitute” was nowhere to be found. Hirah even asked the locals if anyone had seen the shrine prostitute, to which they responded, “We don’t have a shrine prostitute.” ---- Very mysterious!!

“Fine,” said Judah, “she can just keep what she has.”

3 months later….. Judah was told, “Your daughter-in-law is guilty of prostitution AND she’s pregnant!”

Judah was filled with righteous indignation. How dare she do such a thing! “Bring her out and let her be burned alive!!” he commanded.

As Tamar was being dragged out of town, she sent a message to Judah along with a couple of items she’d been hanging on to.

"I am pregnant by the man to whom this seal, cord and staff belong.” ---- “Can you tell me his name?"

BUSTED!!! Judah recognized them and said, "She is more righteous than I because I wouldn't give her to my son Shelah."

Tamar had twins: Perez and Zerah.

It would appear that Judah is changing.

Now we find ourselves back within the story of Joseph. The 7 years of plenty have come and gone and famine has hit – hit hard – even Canaan was impacted.

Jacob sent the 10 oldest sons to Egypt to by grain.

They met the Governor of the land, who seemed pretty testy.

They were accused of spying and thrown in jail for 3 days.

Simeon was forced to stay behind, while the remaining 9 were given grain and told, in no uncertain terms, that they better produce brother #12 at their next visit, or there would be consequences.